Page 47 of The Breakup Artists

“I was with Holden,” Ella tells Justin as we navigate through the carnival.

“Yeah, I saw you run after him,” he says with a barbed tone.

Ella’s cheeks flush as she realizes the same thing I did—Justin’s jealous. She covers her embarrassment with a laugh. “If you knew where I went, then why’d you ask?”

“I’m not allowed to ask my girlfriend questions?” he says like she’s the one who’s making this weird.

“Of course you are. It’s just not a big deal.”

“I guess so,” he says in a way that clearly communicates it is.

Tiny gives me a satisfied look, and I frown.

Ella touches Justin’s arm, but he shrugs her off. “You’re mad?” she asks.

“Should I be?”

“No, you shouldn’t,” she says definitively.

“Fine, then I’m not,” Justin replies in a tone that says the opposite. “Let’s just forget about it.” He reaches forward and taps Sharky’s elbow. “You got that bourbon?”

Amber obligingly pulls the flask from her purse, and Justin moves up beside her, leaving Ella alone.

And the hurt look on Ella’s face irks me. Not only do I have a bone-deep dislike of Justin, I’m not sure I love Tiny’s tactic, either.

I slow my pace and we fall a couple more feet behind the group. “You could have warned me,” I breathe at my best friend, but she only shrugs.

“I told you what we needed to do, and this set up the first domino,” she says, her voice low and mostly masked by the crowd. “I know what you’re worrying about, and I’m not trying to set you up as a rival and get us ousted from this group. We won’t put you in that position again. This just had the beauty of a dual purpose, giving you time to bond and also showing his true colors.” Then she gives me a quasi-suspicious look. “Unless you went rogue and flirted with her, which would obviously be a prob—”

“OfcourseI didn’t,” I say, cutting her off, frustrated that she’d even suggest it. “You know me better than that.”

“Then we have nothing to worry about,” she replies, but my discomfort remains like a tiny barb in a sweater that scratches me when I move but disappears every time I look for it.

26

valentine

I lie in bed under my fluffy white comforter, rereading Bentley’s texts for the five hundredth time. Once again, my fingers pluck at the keys. I type outDon’t worry about itand erase it. Then I typeIt was bound to happenand erase that, too. I toss my phone onto my bed with an exasperated huff.

“What do I care?” I say and place my hands over my eyes. August is the overthinker;I’mthe go-with-the-flow girl. And this is all really simple—I thought I might kiss Bentley, but it turns out he’s unworthy.No biggie.

I pull my hands away from my face and look at my vanity, where my latest notebook lies. Work. That’s exactly what I need to distract myself. I get up and cross the room, taking a good look at myself in the vanity mirror.

“Stop obsessing,” I say to my reflection. “Just be cool.”

The Berkeley sticker in the corner of my mirror snags in my view.California, I think, and once again, my stomach drops at the thought. I stand there for a long moment feeling uncertain and disliking my reaction a disproportionate amount. So I yank the sticker off my mirror and shove it in my drawer, not for good, just until this weird feeling passes. But my stewing is cut short by a loud ping on my window.

I turn so fast that the room spins. My alarm clock reads 11:47 p.m. For a second, I think I must have imagined it. But then,ping.I speed toward my window, conjuring images of things that go bump in the night.

Just as I pull back the curtain, a pebble hits the glass, startling me for a third time. But there’s no monster, only Bentley on the lawn between our houses. And when I see his messy hair and pajamas, I’m instantly furious. I yank open the window and stick my head out.

“What the hell, Bentley? It’s the middle of the night,” I whisper yell.

“Can we talk?” he says, full volume.

I aggressively put my finger to my mouth.

“Can we talk?” he asks again, quieter, but not nearly quiet enough.